The Oregonian Portland, Not Waiting for Amazon, Moves Forward With
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The Oregonian Portland, not waiting for Amazon, moves forward with Post Office plan By Anna Marum November 8, 2017 Even if Amazon chooses another city for its second headquarters, Portland has big plans for the Pearl District Post Office site – including affordable housing and living-wage jobs. The city's urban renewal agency, Prosper Portland, on Wednesday opened the door for developers to submit applications to craft a master plan for the 32 acres at the base of the Broadway Bridge. Officials anticipate redevelopment of the newly dubbed Broadway Corridor district would bring in more than $1 billion in investment. The request envisions a high-density, mixed-used neighborhood that would benefit from the nearby Amtrak train station and serve as a gateway to the city. It also comes less than a month after Portland included the site – along with several other downtown blocks – in its pitch for Amazon's second headquarters, a $5 billion project promising 50,000 jobs. Unlike some other cities, Portland offered no special incentives in its proposal, documents showed. Given its proximity to the retail giant's headquarters in Seattle, Portland is seen as a long-shot for Amazon's second home. Many said Portland didn't have much of a chance, given its proximity to Seattle. If Amazon doesn't choose the City of Roses, the company has prompted Portland to take a hard look at how it wants to grow. Prosper spokesman Shawn Uhlman said Wednesday's call for developers doesn't mean Portland is giving up on Amazon. "We need to move forward with a master plan process regardless of who the tenants may be," he said. If Amazon does choose Portland, he said, "we would just work to implement them into this master planning process as a significant tenant." Wednesday's request, first reported by the Portland Business Journal, called for a developer practiced in public-private partnerships, and one familiar with high-density, mixed-use and mixed-income projects. This map shows the blocks that compose the Broadway Corridor. According to the request, developable blocks of the Broadway Corridor owned by the city include the Post Office superblock site, a block under the Broadway Bridge and two more blocks on Broadway. Greyhound, which operates a bus station at Sixth and Hoyt, may downsize, freeing up more space. Prosper paid $88 million for the Post Office site last year. The Post Office will move to a new facility next to the airport. Portland negotiated to buy land for $34.7 million from Trammell Crow, which bought a former golf course in 2014 for just $6 million. The Broadway Corridor also encompasses Union Station, the Pacific Northwest College of Art, the future site of the Multnomah County Health Department headquarters and the Bud Clark Commons, which houses a homeless shelter and supportive housing. Prosper's plans also call for a park at Park and Glisan, extending the North Park Blocks. In a letter included in the request, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler called for a bold and iconic design, and said the blocks represent a "rare and tremendous opportunity" to create a landmark development in the heart of the city. "I want Portlanders to continue to be able to live in a bikable and walkable neighborhood to position the Broadway Corridor as both a transportation hub and a gateway to the city," he wrote. Prosper chair Gustavo Cruz said in the request that the right developer would be able to deliver affordable housing, environmentally friendly structures and public spaces. "The Broadway Corridor will be a laboratory of inclusion and opportunity, changing Portland's downtown landscape in a way that touches residents from every neighborhood, income level and cultural community," he wrote. Prosper expects to select a developer in April and have a master plan for the Broadway Corridor by mid-2019. Prosper also is looking to recoup at least $40 million, the amount it owes the city for a loan it took out to buy the Post Office property. Groups call on Portland City Council to end cooperation with FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force By Jim Ryan November 8, 2017 The ACLU of Oregon and more than 20 other groups on Wednesday called for the Portland City Council to end city cooperation with the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force, signaling the latest turn in a saga dating back two decades. Kimberly McCullough of the American Civil Liberties Union, speaking before the council, said concerns about the task force are intensified by the presidential administration's "utter disregard for civil rights and civil liberties" and "recent statements and actions" by the FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which she referred to as the task force's largest players. Portland began on-and-off involvement in the task force in 1997 and is currently involved. The City Council voted in 2015 to assign two officers to the task force, reversing Portland's outlier status nationally as the only big city at the time that didn't assign officers to participate on a full-time basis. A 2011 City Council vote had allowed "as-needed" involvement after the City Council had voted to cut ties in 2005. Neither Mayor Ted Wheeler nor any of the present city councilors had any immediate response to the appeal from McCullough and two others opposed to Portland's involvement in the task force. A Portland police spokesman said Wednesday evening that he was working on providing responses to Oregonian/OregonLive questions posed late that morning about the task force. The FBI describes its Joint Terrorism Task Forces as "small cells" of local investigators, analysts and other specialists from dozens of agencies. The agency said the task forces "provide one-stop shopping for information regarding terrorist activities" and that "they pool talents, skills, and knowledge from across the law enforcement and intelligence communities into a single team that responds together." The task forces operate out of 104 cities across the country and include about 4,000 members. Members of the task force in October arrested a Rock Creek man who's been accused of assault on a federal officer and using and carrying an explosive in the course of committing a felony. Federal agents initiated an investigation into the man, Jason Paul Schaefer, in late September amid concerns that he had been buying an explosive liquid called nitromethane, remotes used to set off fireworks and more than 100 electric matches. In written testimony addressed to the mayor and councilors, distributed to the media beforehand, McCullough described the relationship between the city and FBI as "problematic." She said the task force "has a long history of surveillance of lawful First Amendment activity and of other civil rights abuses" and said the task force works in secrecy and with little oversight. The groups call on the City Council to withdraw the pair of full-time Portland officers from the task force and cancel a memorandum of agreement with the federal agency. "This lack of transparency also makes it very difficult to know how and when rights violations involve Portland Police Bureau officers who are deputized as JTTF officers and who operate under the authority of the FBI," McCullough wrote. The written testimony referenced a letter submitted to the council and signed by 23 organizations, including the Albina Ministerial Alliance Coalition for Justice and Police Reform, Unite Oregon and the Oregon chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Lawyer Brandon Mayfield, who was wrongly accused by the FBI in 2004 of being linked to a train bombing in Madrid, also backs the effort and addressed the City Council on Wednesday. "Please quit targeting ethnic minorities and immigrants and do the right thing, the respectable thing, the safe thing, the reasonable thing and withdraw like our sister city, San Francisco, from the JTTF," he said. Portland to spend $12 million surplus on police, homeless, roads and new positions By Jessica Floum November 8, 2017 The city of Portland has a $12 million surplus from last year's budget, and it plans to spend much of it to add to the city's police force, operate homeless shelters and complete infrastructure projects. The new spending, approved Wednesday, will be on top of the $516 million spending plan for 2017-18 that the City Council approved in May. In addition to adding temporary jobs to the police force to prepare for a wave of retirements, the council approved adding 66 other full-time jobs across the city's 27 bureaus. At least 50 percent of funds leftover from the beginning budget — $6 million — will go to major maintenance and infrastructure costs, as city rules require. About $5 million will go to a bridge replacement project on Northeast 42nd Avenue at Lombard Street. The Portland Communication Center and the Justice Center will each get $500,000 to ensure uninterrupted power. In April, a power outage at the Bureau of Emergency Communications blocked calls to 911 for a half an hour. Among the largest discretionary allocations approved Wednesday were $2 million for the Portland Police Bureau and $1.7 million for the Joint Office of Homeless services to add year- round and winter emergency shelters for homeless people. The council also approved $570,000 for increased security at City Hall. "The city continues to benefit from a strong economy, allowing us to make additional investments in urgent priorities," Mayor Ted Wheeler said. The city has benefited from surpluses each fall since 2013, said City Budget Officer Andrew Scott. Because the city sets a conservative budget every spring, there are often more opportunities for spending, referred to in city lingo as "the bump," come fall.